The Washington state Department of Natural Resources on Monday released its quarterly Economic and Revenue Forecast, and the report detected faint signs of life in the state’s timber economy.

Such indicators as housing starts and timber prices are off their lows from earlier this year. But those indicators still have a long way to go just to reach levels from 12 months ago.

“Things are finally starting to look up,” Phil Aust, the department’s lead economist, wrote in the introduction. He quickly added: “But when you are in such a deep hole, it’s hard to look anywhere but up.”

National housing starts during the last quarter ran 9 percent higher than the previous quarter, according to the report. Yet housing starts remain 43 percent below the same period in 2008.

Timber prices have recovered — sort of. Since April, the composite price of the department’s timber has climbed 28 percent to $165 per thousand board feet. But that price is still down 37 percent from a year ago.

“There are lots of reasons to believe that the recovery this time around will be very slow,” Aust concluded.